Games Workshop has installed a new policy for its retailers that goes into effect today.

GW partnership stores can no longer open products to sell bits. This means that any store with a GW account will not be able to do this. Now the question that needs to be asked....

Is GW going back into bits market? It has been a long time since bits were available from Games Workshop, and it would not surprise me much if they are looking at it, with a sense that more revenue could be garnered from doing this.

Regardless, many very popular bits stores will be feeling the heat. Of course I am sure there are ways around this, but the pressure is on.

I wouldn't be surprised if they're just running with the assumption that people buying from bit sellers would buy more whole kits if said sellers weren't available. Not gonna hold my breath for geedubs to start selling bits again without more proof than this.

I didn't say it was -good- logic, it simply wouldn't surprise me if it was an idea gw got into their heads to try. I'm not unilaterally hating on them, they generally do decent work in my opinion. They just have enough of a weird love/hate relationship with their customer base that they might think they could get away with it.

I looked into on-line trading some years back they keep changing the rules all the time with regards to minimum orders etc. At the time it was quite clear in the brochure that your not supposed to open stuff and sell individual bitz.Maybe they're just reiterating it to make it clearer.The real question is how would they prove that a bit's site wasn't just selling bits they've acquired via trade such as by offering store credit.

This policy has been in effect the 2 years I've been a stockist so far. Maybe they're re inforcing the point and pating more attention? I won't start to dream just yet at the return of a GW bitz store.

This policy has been in effect the 2 years I've been a stockist so far. Maybe they're re inforcing the point and pating more attention? I won't start to dream just yet at the return of a GW bitz store.

Also, to everyone hoping for the return of bitz, remember, GW never really did single plastic bits. It was mostly metal bits and then plastic sprues. Now, that was a time when a large portion of GW line was metal, so how they would do it now were they to start doing bitz again, i can't say.

Another Change in the policies: Forgeworld products can only be ordered until the end of the month in GW-stores (without any additional shipping costs) After that it's FW only. They want to start their own thing now. An austrian employee told me, that this is a company-wide decision, it therefore also will effect other stores around the globe...

As an IG Player, this is indeed bad news. no more savings on FW orders shipped to the local store...

No - I feel that "See a need, fill a need" is something others have been trying to do for us the consumer with this screwball company. GW doesn't like that because some "might" break even or turn a profit on something besides Friday Night Magic. Instead of actually communicating with the gaming community, they GO OUT OF THEIR FREAKING WAY to keep alienating their customer base. And then rinse and repeat. At least rogue trader was fun and able to make fun of itself.

This seems like a very bad thing. GW stopped offering bits services many years ago, which allowed several small businesses to start up, now they want those businesses to just stop doing what they do. The retailers are already paying for the product from GW, what difference does it make if I as a private seller buy a box and break it down to sell the parts on ebay, or a public seller does the same? GW is pushing too hard. This is only going to get more extreme.

Seems to me there is about to become a niche market for some one to run a bits swapping blog or site that will rectify this problem. ebitz or some such, where hobbyists from all over can haggle, trade and swap bits for the price of shipping alone? We'll all work around this like we always do because we are creative and pretty damn smart if I do say so myself :)

Well, not new for me... GW have always refused to provide me with kit... I must buy them to discounter like wayland. Bits bussiness takes a very long time work... don't think GW want paid staff to do that ! I believe if GW attack bits market, it will not be like me (us) but with resin-kit... not sprue-cut ! (David from inhumanbitzbox)

Honestly I am not too upset about this, I have a local retailer that was doing this with all new releases so it made it hard to get new kits as they came out...The other problem was the exhorberant cost of some of the bits from the kits, I am sorry its going to hurt some retailers, but from what I have heard this policy was already essentially in existence they just weren't enforcing it until now.

And honestly snything that keeps that annoying little shill from Spikeybits from posting supposed articles on sites like BOLS about converting that were just ads for his business the better.

Most bits dealers have priced the bits I've wanted at a significant fraction of the cost of the original box. Since I refuse to buy a single Devastator Marine missile launcher and backpack (Marine not included) for 1/4 to 1/3 the cost of an entire box, I've simply bought the whole box and then looked for ways to spread the extra parts throughout my army.

It seems like the best workaround to the policy would be some sort of bits exchange. My plasma weapons tend to kill more of my own Marines than enemy troops, so I have a half dozen plasma cannons I would gladly trade.

I do not see how GW could possibly enforce this across the board. Sure they could shut down Spikeybits and the War Store's bits service but what about the hundreds of other bits suppliers out there? Most of them do not even buy direct form GW but from other sources.

What if they are starting to head into the way of Bitz? they got rid of the Tau Commander set and now sell the bitz instead, same story with Broadsides. They have also added gun drones on their own, and sell an bitz upgrade to turn them into shield drones. (that option is new) I remember having to buy specific packs to get my shield drones. and the hammerhead upgrade sprues have been constant, you can buy an devilfish and upgrade it to hammerhead via sprue no such story with the Skyray, but the Skyray kit comes with the hammerhead upgrade in it.

I think all this does is drive up the costs of bits. The bits retailers will just find another source, but wont be able to purchase kits as cheap. The cost of buying from another wholesaler will then be shifted to the price of the bits.

Personally I doubt they're planning on a new venture selling bits, beyond what they already do. Instead, they're doing this move to get people to stop buying just the bitz they want and instead get the whole box and hence, MOAR PROFITS!

It's simply a move towards people buying whole boxes...but, they can't eliminate it...it'll all just move to ebay.

I'm surprised that anyone sees this as an idea to get people to return to stores, a better idea to get people to come back into stores would be to allow people to assemble stuff and game in store which they stopped a month ago, clearly they don't want people in stores.

and, as has already been pointed out, this was (as well as not allowing FW to be ordered in stores) already policy in UK

I noticed on the forge world site that many of the upgrade kits other than for forge world specific kits ie horus heresy kits have gone away at least for space marines would that mean anything to anybody?

159 - Taking a Walk on the Purple Side
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Over the weekend (with the wife away), I managed to get a little bit of my painting mojo back. Having stared at the built but not painted models that clutter...

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